You will look at us with these prying, insisting eyes. You will wonder — possibly out loud — why we feel that we can’t be honest with you about how we’re feeling. We will avoid your glance and say “I’m fine,” even though everyone in the conversation is more than aware that we’re not. In fact, “fine” is a pleasant, distant stasis that we haven’t imagined attaining in longer than we can remember. But when you look at us like that, with those eyes that insist on a kind of honesty we have never felt comfortable displaying, there is no chance that we will answer. We will shake our heads, say “nothing,” and walk away.

We have always been told that this honesty is ugly. We have been afraid, as long as we can remember, of coming across as the girl who is too much all at once. We know…